


Merry Ain't In My Vocabulary

by betweentheheavesofstorm



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, British, Christmas, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Fluff, F/F, Ficlet, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Gift Fic, Les Miserables Secret Santa, One Shot, Secret Santa, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 12:51:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8980498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betweentheheavesofstorm/pseuds/betweentheheavesofstorm
Summary: Hi,’ Cosette says. ‘Um, I was wondering if you could do me a favour.’ Éponine opens the door a little wider, so that she can lean on the doorframe. She takes deliberate care in folding her arms, aware that it makes her look more intimidating.  ‘What is it?’ A short, fluffy Christmas one-shot I've written for a Les Mis Secret Santa.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Christmas [marcellin-e](http://marcellin-e.tumblr.com)!

Éponine likes being a person who’s hard to surprise. She doesn’t have the widest skill set – her only other accomplishments are being able to apply killer eyeliner and holding liquor better than anyone she knows. (She can even outdrink Montparnasse, that’s how good she is.)

Still, when Cosette Fauchevalent knocks on her door at 2am with an armful of fairy lights, it’s enough to make Éponine take a step back.

To add context to this; she and Cosette don’t really speak. No, even that is an understatement. Cosette is the only person on the floor she knows nothing about. She doesn’t hang around halls much, so has skipped a lot of the flatmate bonding, but nearly everyone else she’s had at least one midnight meeting with as they both make toast, or something.

Probably the reason that Cosette’s flown under her radar is the fact that she has, like, a normal schedule. As far as Éponine can tell, the girl gets up and goes to bed at sensible times, eats proper meals and spends a lot of time either working in her room at the library. You know, what university students are supposed to do.

‘Hi,’ Cosette says. ‘Um, I was wondering if you could do me a favour.’

Éponine opens the door a little wider, so that she can lean on the doorframe. She takes deliberate care in folding her arms, aware that it makes her look more intimidating. ‘What is it?’

‘I need to decorate the kitchen.’ Cosette holds up the lights. ‘I completely forgot that I promised Enjolras I would, and then he messaged me saying he couldn’t wait to see it and I had a slight meltdown. Everyone else is asleep or out. If you’re busy then that’s fine. I just … need help.’

There are at least a dozen reasons Éponine should say no. She’s finally got Bahorel’s Netflix password, and had intended to stay up into the small hours of the night by binge-watching something terrible. Plus she barely speaks to Cosette, so she has no obligation to help her. And if she agrees now, Cosette might take that as a cue to talk to her more, which wouldn’t be great. There’s something off-putting about the girl’s doe-eyed cuteness; she seems way too soft and sweet for Éponine to be able to take her seriously.

Then again, she doesn’t get surprised very often.

‘All right,’ she says, ‘but if you insist on playing Christmas music while we decorate I’m gone.’

That makes Cosette laugh. ‘No music,’ she promises. ‘I’m not really a fan of Christmas songs. I’ve only just got Mariah Carey out of my head.’

‘I get you,’ Éponine says, stepping back to grab a jumper before joining Cosette in the hallway. The radiators are broken in the kitchen, so since October it’s been fluctuating between damp English morning and Arctic tundra.

Cosette smiles. ‘Thanks so much for this. I really appreciate it.’

‘I haven’t done anything yet. I could develop an allergic reaction to the tinsel and spend the night in A&E.’

She begins walking to the kitchen, and after a couple of steps Éponine follows her.

‘So you’re not a fan of Christmas?’

‘Not really. Why is it so important to your brother that the kitchen gets decorated?’

‘It’s complicated. At home we used to go full-out at Christmas. Like, we’d start putting up lights on the first of December. We were that obnoxious family that everyone hates because we do all our present shopping in November. Enjolras has been really homesick, so I promised him that I’d do the kitchen.’

‘That’s sweet.’ Éponine can’t imagine caring about a holiday that much. The only reason she’s counting down to when the holidays start is because it means a break from essay writing.

‘It’ll be his turn next year,’ Cosette shrugs, pushing the kitchen door. A wave of cold air hits them as they step out of the heated corridor and Éponine becomes immensely grateful that she remembered a jumper.

‘Wow,’ she says. ‘You weren’t kidding.’

Strewn over every surface are Christmas decorations: boxes of baubles and lights and tinsel gathered in heaps like ultra sparkly caterpillars.

Éponine takes it in. ‘Did Santa throw up in here, or just his elves?’

‘I thought we could focus on the tree,’ Cosette says, pointing to a box Éponine hadn’t seen. ‘It’s only a little one, so it shouldn’t take too long.’

‘Did you buy all this yourself?’

‘Um, no.’ Cosette seems embarrassed. ‘Everyone on the floor chipped in.’

Apart from Éponine, she means. Éponine can’t even remember being asked. Maybe they did and she forgot. Maybe they assumed she wouldn’t be interested. It’s not like they were wrong.

She hovers awkwardly as Cosette gets the tree out of the box.

‘It’s self-assembly,’ Cosette says, placing several green, spiky sections on the table. ‘And no, I didn’t get it from IKEA.’

‘I’m so relieved it’s green.’ Éponine crosses to the table to help. It’s easy to see which piece is meant to go at the top, but the others are all more or less the same size.

‘What do you mean? It’s a tree.’

‘Yeah, but you see a lot of those white fake trees. Those are ugly as shit.’

‘This girl I used to be friends with had a bright pink tree,’ Cosette remembers. ‘It might have looked OK with silver tinsel or something, only her family insisted on decorating it like it was a normal tree. It was possibly the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen.’

‘I saw a brown plastic one once. Can’t get much more festive than something that looks like it’s dead.’

Cosette pulls a face. She’s poring over the different pieces of the tree, trying to figure out how they’re supposed to be attached. Neither of them have figured out the sizing thing either, so that’s another obstacle.

Realising that they could be there for a long time, Éponine makes a snap decision and begins attaching them. They don’t immediately fall apart, which has got to be a good sign.

‘It’s so weird that you’re at uni with your brother,’ she says, as the thought occurs to her. ‘Most people come here to get _away_ from their family.’

‘That’s not true.’ Cosette begins adjusting the wire branches in an attempt to make them look natural. ‘Have you heard Courfeyrac talk about his sister?’

‘Many times. He once spent half an hour trying to convince me that she was a musical prodigy because she learned _Twinkle Twinkle Little Star_ on the piano faster than he did at her age.’

‘Don’t you miss your family?’

‘My siblings, yeah.’ She has a photo of Azelma and Gavroche in her wallet, and a framed one on her bookshelf. ‘I don’t know, it’s just weird that you two are at the same place. In the same accommodation.’

‘It’s nice.’ Cosette shrugs. ‘We’re used to doing things together. There was a point, years ago, when we liked to tell people we were twins to confuse them. I think it was also us dealing with the fact that we’re the most obviously adopted family ever. You can’t exactly be subtle when your dad’s white, you’re half Chinese and your brother’s Black.’

‘I see the problem.’ She fixes the top part to the tree and tilts her head, looking at it. ‘What do you think?’

‘It’s good! I think we got it right.’

‘Do you want lights on the tree or are you going to put them around the walls?’ She’s starting to think that maybe Cosette isn’t so bad. Sure, she’s still preppy and enthusiastic and pretty, but she’s capable of holding up her end of a conversation.

‘I’m not sure. I think the strings might be a bit long for the tree.’

‘Tinsel and baubles it is then.’

‘You’re enjoying this,’ says Cosette, prompting Éponine to take back all the nice things she’d just thought about her.

‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that. My hatred to Christmas is deeply rooted.’ She squints at Cosette. ‘You wouldn’t be trying to change that, would you? This wasn’t a disaster you manufactured?’

‘Oh, no. I wouldn’t have the balls. There’s something about someone with perfect eyeliner at 2am that’s really intimidating.’

‘Does it get less intimidating if I say that I’m leaving it on so I can wear it tomorrow?’

‘I think it’s just gross then.’

‘Oh, like you’ve never slept with makeup on.’

‘I always take it off in the morning.’

Éponine lapses into silence. It’s weird, how easily they can talk when they barely know each other. Cosette is, well, sharper than she expected. Funnier. And yeah, maybe prettier, but that doesn’t mean anything. She’s not Éponine’s type. She’s too…festive.

It’s easier when they can just focus on the tree. They wind tinsel round it, weaving the pieces between the spindly branches. Then they’ve got to add baubles; red and gold ones still in their supermarket packaging. Éponine tries very hard to concentrate on individual parts of the tree, and not on how strands of Cosette’s hair have started to fall out of her ponytail, framing her face.

It’s almost a shame when they’re finished, and can awkwardly maneuver it into the corner.

‘Do you have something for the top?’ Éponine asks, standing back to look at it properly.

Cosette freezes. ‘Shit,’ she mutters. ‘I knew I was forgetting something. _Shit._ ’

‘It doesn’t have to be a star. Anything glittery would probably do. One of my friends just hangs earrings on his tree.’

‘Really?’

‘It looks quite good, actually.’ In recent years, Bahorel has been all about DIY Christmas decorations. ‘If you’ve got hoops we could make a mini halo for the tree.’

‘That sounds cute, but I don’t. Wait, I’ve got an idea.’ Cosette hurries from the kitchen and reappears thirty seconds later clutching a little red rosette.

‘Should I congratulate you on a showjumping victory?’

‘They’re from Enjolras’s society,’ Cosette explains. ‘It’s a social justice thing, though I keep telling him red is getting them confused with the communist society.’

‘It would be so much more ironic if he was part of the communist society,’ Éponine says, watching her pin the rosette to the top of the tree. ‘And having that at the top of a symbol of capitalist consumerism.’

Cosette laughs. ‘Maybe you’d like to join. I fondly mock him, but the ABC is actually pretty good.’

‘I don’t really do societies.’ It’s not quite true, she’s been attending weekly horror movie screenings. Though that’s less of an organized group and more of a gathering of morbid emos.

‘You know, you give off all these ‘I don’t give a fuck’ vibes, and yet here you are.’ Satisfied with the tree, Cosette begins hanging lights over the window. ‘Being a pillar of the community.’

‘It’s a thing about spontaneity: you tend to do things unexpectedly.’

Cosette can’t quite reach the top of the kitchen shelves, where she’s trying to hang lights. Éponine lets her strain for a moment and then walks over to help. She’s a good head taller than Cosette and can reach easily. She’s just about to hook the lights over the corner of the shelf when she feels Cosette’s breath on her back. It throws her off; the cable loop misses the corner and she has to try very hard to make it look like an accident.

Her second try is more successful, probably because by then Cosette has gone back to the table for more tinsel.

‘I can’t believe we’ve been in the same halls for three months and I barely know you,’ Cosette says.

Éponine’s stomach lurches. So far, she’d been operating under the assumption that the night was a one-time deal. One of those midnight bonding sessions that happen and afterwards you think they might have been a dream.

But the way Cosette is talking now, it’s as if they’re friends all of a sudden. Which implies future hanging out. And with how cute she is, that doesn’t _necessarily_ have to be a bad thing, though Éponine’s gut is telling her that that path only leads to pining and drinking sadly and alone.

‘I’m practically nocturnal,’ she says, with as casual a shrug as she can muster.

‘Like a hamster.’

God, this girl is ridiculous. ‘I was thinking more like a vampire.’

‘Imagine a vampire hamster.’

‘I’m terrified.’

‘And you’re never going to be intimidating again. Every time I see you I’m just going to imagine a hamster with little fangs.’

‘Great. A rodent ruins my reputation.’

‘It doesn’t have to be a bad thing. There aren’t enough girls on this floor.’ Cosette shifts. ‘We could hang out.’

‘Yeah. Maybe.’

‘Have you met Musichetta?’

‘Once or twice.’

‘Were you hiding from us? Are you an _actual_ vampire?’

‘It’s not like that.’

It is like that. Well, not the vampire part. She’s well past her _Twilight_ phase, thank God.

‘Then what it is like?’ Cosette plugs in her lights and turns them on. ‘For ages I thought you hated people, but that’s obviously not true.’

‘Oh?’

‘You’re chatting with me and you barely know me. In fact, I’ve been told that some people feel put off by my friendliness.’

‘You’re wrong.’ Éponine says, focusing on the piece of tinsel she’s wrapping around a cupboard handle. ‘I _don’t_ like people, but I do make exceptions for cute girls.’

She hadn’t hoped to fluster Cosette exactly, but certainly throw her off course. Éponine’s usually so aggressive that when she compliments people it comes as a surprise.

Unfortunately, Cosette is undeterred.

‘Cute girls who you spend all time ignoring?’

Damn. ‘I wouldn’t say _ignoring._ Just that you’re not around when I’m around.’

‘Which takes us back to the nocturnal issue.’

‘Just pass me that piece of tinsel, OK?’

Cosette smirks. ‘What do you have against Christmas?’

‘I don’t see the point. It’s just glorifying capitalism.’

‘You’d get along so well with Enjolras. Maybe you _should_ join his society.’

‘Do I look like I want to run bake sales?’

‘What if you were doing it with cute girls?’ Cosette wiggles her eyebrows, prompting Éponine to regret ever giving that compliment.

‘Exploiting my gayness. That’s just unfair.’

‘How about this?’ Tinsel forgotten, Cosette steps forward. ‘I’ll knock on your door sometimes when I feel like hanging out, and you can do the same.’

‘I never feel like hanging out.’

‘Ah, that’s because I didn’t mention that some of the time I’d be inviting you to come and eat cupcakes.’ She’s grinning now. ‘And you will say yes every time because my cupcakes are _amazing.’_

Fuck. Éponine has seriously underestimated her. Who would have thought she’d be losing to someone with fairy lights strung up around their desk?

‘Why do you want to be friends so bad? There have got to be people at this university who don’t need bribery to talk to you.’

‘You interest me. And you’re hot. Yeah, I can be brazen too.’

‘First of all, who uses the word _brazen_ , and second, I am fully willing to break the housemate rule and hook up with you but only as a one time thing.’

How has their conversation got to _here_ , in the space of five minutes?

Cosette shakes her head. ‘I’m flattered, but I’m not a one-night-stand person.’

‘I can tell.’

‘What about a compromise?’

Éponine raises her eyebrows. ‘What sort of compromise?’

‘I do hook up with you, but you have to go on a date with me first.’

‘How is that so different from my idea?’

‘’Cause I’m going to spend that date convincing you we should have more. And,’ she continues, gathering steam, ‘if there is one thing I’m better at than baking, it’s sex.’

What the hell. What does Éponine have to lose? At the worst, she’ll have to suffer through one bad date. It’s not like she hasn’t been on those before.

‘OK,’ she says. ‘Look at me; going on a date. It’s a fucking Christmas miracle.’

And she’ll be damned if Cosette’s smile isn’t brighter than all the lights in the kitchen.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for the Les Mis Secret Santa, organised by [this blog](http://lesmiserablessecretsanta.tumblr.com).
> 
> I can also be found on Tumblr [here](http://betweentheheavesofstorm.tumblr.com)
> 
> Happy Holidays!


End file.
